At Chalkboarder our mission statement clearly states we build and nurture interdependent villages. Today, we’re launching a new weekly bulletin that shares brief profiles of others around the world who seem to share this vision. Please join me in connecting with and supporting these folks and organizations. Jeff Kingman, CEO, Chalkboarder

SkillSetG is a startup dedicated to providing relevant employment tips/skills to college graduates internationally.

Our mission?

Chalkboarder is tasked with building out and managing an aggressive social media optimization of the client, across world cultures, targeting soon-to-be or recent college graduates. Welcome aboard, SkillSetG!

Jabriel has been actively involved in helping create the dynamic reputation of several Oregon based cocktail and bartending events, including Cocktail Week.

Our mission?

Assist Jabriel with creating and opening his own unique lounge and cafe in SE Portland. Tasks include preparing the business plan, identifying partners, project management during buildout and launch, and social media optimization. We’re particularly enthused with this project as it blends two core competencies of Chalkboarder: brand/concept development and social media optimization.

Are you seeking an effective solution for your organization? Check out what Chalkboarder can do…

Over the years, I’ve built some pretty large communities in social media, both for myself and for some clients. As those communities were built, my HAED (hyper-active-entrepreneurial-disorder) brain neglected a necessary task. Categorizing connections into lists and taking notes on their attributes (friends, careers, interests and relationships).

Now, today, I have a problem. It’s simply overwhelming to pay attention to key relationships, when their social networking is scattered amongst everyone’s activity. I miss stuff that I know is key and relevant, as a result.

Over the last couple months, I’ve been slowly recovering a better footing, making sure to list new folks and spending a bit of time going back and doing this with older connections. My favorite list is Met In Real Life; thanks to @RickBakas for that great suggestion.

I’ve developed broad categories mostly related to professions and interests. I look at connection’s profiles to determine where they fit.

What does putting people into lists allow me to do? How is it better for me? With lists, I can go to a category and catchup with what others are up too. It streamlines my “reading of the news” from others. For clients, it’s a great way to categorize current customers, potential customers and other areas of interest.

Are you using lists in your social networking? What works for you to manage all the incoming content?

In 1886, Richard Warren Sears (founder of Sears, Roebuck & Co.) was working as an agent-telegrapher at a railroad line in Minnesota. A shipment of 2500 gold pocket watches arrived at the station where he worked. As no one had asked for them and nobody wanted, he decided to buy them all. He then offered the watches to his railroad colleagues, using the telegraph to market… and sold them all at $14, earning $2per clock.

Yes, you read the title right. I like it rough and slow. I’m a little different that way. Perhaps hardcore might be another descriptive term. Or.. someone might say “he has an appreciation for the unusual”.

You see, I find opportunities where others might discount none to be. I look for the little clues that signal these potentialities. I’m willing to venture through unusual circumstance, that others would shudder at, to perhaps find that rare gem of an opportunity.

Sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not talking about sex. Yes, I was leading you on; intentionally.

Rough Riders

I’ve always been a traveler – a bit of a nomad. I grew up that way and it in large part defines me. I feel trapped, or better, caged and bound, if I am unable to experience new vistas and experiences. I meet interesting folk this way. Sometimes, the people I meet have ability to transform and positively impact not only me, but the opportunities before Chalkboarder.

As I write this, I am up all night, at Boston South Station, waiting for the final leg of a six day journey across the USA. I boarded AmtrakEmpire Builder in Oregon five and half days ago. We were almost a full day late into Chicago. Let’s look at the results from enduring lack of showers, lack of beds and lack of sleep this week.

Amtrak Regional Operations Director – Pacific Northwest. I bumped into this gentleman at the hotel they provided me for a half day in Chicago, between trains. An excellent representative of great customer service; honestly inquiring to my welfare and comfort. We’ll have coffee sometime later this summer.

Amtrak Empire Builder Cafe Car Attendant – Actually, someone I have had twice before using Amtrak between Chicago and the Pacific Northwest. We remembered each other’s names and chitchatted at length. He owns a restaurant in Milwaukee, WI and I gave him pointers on his social media.

Harvard Behaviorial Health Professor – my seatmate from Chicago to Boston; one heck of a conversation, culminating in contact info trade and the possibility of reconnecting for coffee on Harvard’s campus.

Al Jazerra English Senior Technical Producer, London UK – this young gentleman and I had an outstanding conversation in Chicago, and have already traded tweets. I’m a big news junkie and he was grilling my opinions on the political landscape of the USA. Perhaps the most solid connection of this trip, and my introductory relationship to the Arab World.

Brooklyn Latino – this father and daughter made the trip with me across the country. His daughter, same age as my littlest, and I shared quite a few giggles. The father, while not fluent in English, and I got to know each other and have made plans to hang in Brooklyn sometime soon, where he will introduce me to his ethnic neighborhood.

I met others, such as the young gentleman who shared the very early morning hours with me here in South Station, who is from Worcester (pronounced Wooster in these parts) and just transformed a layoff from National Grid into an excellent new opportunity. He checked out Chalkboarder’s website and immediately referred four local Boston/Worcester businesses to me.

This is why I like it rough and slow. I am most definitely in need of a shower (I stink!). I need to do laundry. I’m coffee’d out. My ass hurts from sitting. My right knee is killing me with an arthritic dullness from not walking. I took a nap on the marble floor of South Station just before writing this..

Travel by airline, as the majority of travelers do, simply does not provide you with these opportunities to connect. It simply can’t. Why?

Everyone is stressed out.

You hurry through the system in lines.

Time is rushed. Get here, get there, don’t talk to others – such a isolating experience and yet so ironically, all together.

You can’t move about and randomly get into conversations with your other travelers.

So… how do you like it? Fast quickies with strangers? Or taking the time to get to know people?

This morning, having breakfast, checking my smart phone, a request through Facebook chat popped up. A friend of mine, in Florida, had left her car and cell phone at another friends and was stuck at home with only a laptop.

“Jeff, can you call me a cab?”

Through Facebook chat on the smartphone, I got the Florida cab phone number and her address, and called her a cab. The dispatcher thought it was hilarious and said it was a first for him. “Hi, I’m calling from Oregon to get a cab…”

To enter, simply be the person who checks in to the most booths on Foursquare during the three days of Coffee Fest this weekend. There’s a couple of other small details, but that’s basically how you can win a year of social media for your business for free.

Every booth at Coffee Fest San Diego has a Foursquare venue check-in. Enter the Show and search on Foursquare for “Coffee Fest San Diego”. You’ll see them all listed:

Tradeshows provide a unique opportunity to bring together industries. They offer community-building in centralized real-time, provide buyers with connective opportunities to meet sellers, provide industry specific educational opportunities and.. most importantly, have the potential to leverage all of this to broad-path long-tail effectiveness via the social web. Leverage through the social web:

provides exhibitors and attendees greater contact time – before, during and after

deepens the educational experience for attendees, both in products/services and in seminars

creates a broad path of micro data points, all search engine optimized, for both the tradeshow and exhibitors (and attendees, for that matter)

deepens the connective fabric of the industry

We’ve been following the Twitter hashtag for this event #NRAShow, since the beginning and have made some initial observations of engagement by Show attendees and exhibitors.

Before sharing these, a shout-out must go to Paul Barron, for providing a hashtag metric analysis site we could observe. Paul purchased a hashtag tracking service which can be found here for the NRA Show: http://bit.ly/jOU8JB

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592 – Number of Contributors to Hashtag

86 – Number of Exhibitor Twitter Accounts Using Hashtag

506 – Number of Non-Exhibitor Twitter Accounts Using Hashtag

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14.5% – Percentage of Exhibitor Twitter Accounts to Total Tweeters on Hashtag

1019 – Average # of Followers – Exhibitors Using Hashtag

9 – Average # of Tweets During Show – Exhibitors Using Hashtag

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85.5% – Percentage of Non-Exhibitors to Total Tweeters on Hashtag

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4.7% – Percentage of Hashtag Tweeting Exhibitors to Estimated # of Show Exhibitors

1% – Percentage of Hashtag Tweeting Non-Exhibitors to Estimated # of Show Attendees

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Chalkboarder’s Opinions

Exhibitor adoption, as evidenced by the hashtag traffic, is still in its infancy.

Attendees interacting with Show exhibit hashtag useage rate six times that of exhibitors.

Show management could do a better job of marketing the social web interaction to both exhibitors and attendees.

Exhibitors could develop strategies using traditional marketing that drive potential attendees into the social web before, during and after the Show.

The National Restaurant Show has a clear opportunity to exponentially increase exhibitor exposure (sales opportunities) to attendees using the social web in future shows. Effective deployment of a comprehensive strategy should include:

Year round social web engagement by Show management with exhibitors and existing/potential attendees.

Provide exhibitors with social web tools to increase engagement between exhibitors and attendees before, during and after the Show. Such tools might include:

Traditional marketing “pushes” to the social web connectivity with exhibitors

Marketing promotions to attendees by exhibitors to connect in social media, via traditional and social web strategies

Provide an online database, searchable by product/service category, for visitors to the Show website to find exhibitor social web accounts – significantly prior to the Show

Wrap-up

Nothing beats getting face-to-face at a tradeshow. Social media, conducted well, considerably leverages the opportunity to bring exhibitors and attendees together during a Show. Exhibitors and attendees who have connected and conversed prior to actually meeting at Show time, make the most efficient use of their time, leading to other potentialities to present to both attendees and exhibitors.

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Notes on Data

1. List of Identified Exhibitors Using the Hashtag

Top and bottom four not used in calculations.

Twitter Account # Followers # Following # Tweets

nutrilabeling 0 0 67

jamesoneida 5 16 12

epicuredigital 6 5 73

hubertco 7 0 0

99apps 25 0 24

vinnyoneida 25 85 28

chicagobuffets 27 87 80

pepsicofoodserv 36 259 24

compelcart 41 91 296

winecrusader 43 37 283

manualsolution 54 103 29

adstonature 58 138 64

getpunchh 65 76 148

mccormick4chefs 76 80 103

olo 80 63 70

tlpriest 85 121 97

magictradeshows 99 200 211

smrestaurants 130 218 188

culinitweets 132 138 94

merchantware 136 302 110

expion 137 41 292

vollrathco 151 101 221

finelinesetting 156 421 503

bungemoe 169 222 269

hennypenny 174 217 585

scotsmanice 210 249 312

wineshowcasemag 233 755 4

squirrelsystems 236 455 156

grecian_delight 240 256 505

nrnjobplate 241 153 1124

usfoodservicesf 257 516 439

ifanca 258 300 351

cobblestoneoven 263 1172 98

capitolcups 267 420 823

hospitalitypads 281 1003 33

intlspices 295 950 80

chefbigshake 320 199 186

wineshield 323 761 209

idahoanfoods 358 733 328

hobartcorp 366 190 617

digitalmenubox 374 1012 440

fishbowljoe 376 482 594

back2scratch 392 313 1289

thermapen 428 477 480

heartlandhpy 433 398 673

peoplematterceo 466 362 1029

tsbrass 467 471 530

turtletransit 471 942 91

wasserstrom 480 676 871

oneida_ltd 507 273 162

gpprofessional 508 678 960

monkeydish 538 502 741

ssproducts 540 1999 397

shomack12 562 746 2980

rewardsnetwork 675 426 792

loveandquiches 691 1042 1048

socialgrub 755 1263 163

dietzandwatson 758 996 667

openmenu 786 1469 2237

fohbohgal 877 488 4488

laudividni 879 455 861

anchorhocking 881 885 2003

hospitalitysoc 937 1999 47

hospitalityrew 951 2000 30

graciousgourmet 1068 2003 1320

rubbermaidcomm 1186 325 190

fastcasual 1307 389 1132

safeeggs 1344 1676 1620

wileycooks 1405 921 822

calphalon 1561 1230 250

nrnmarketing 1796 697 503

flatoutbread 1926 1848 4778

viennabeef 2315 1023 2170

eatsauca 2343 113 75

fishbowlinc 2514 1892 364

fohboh 2721 1392 2767

herbalwater 3563 3290 1644

activeion 3653 3190 1144

communitycoffee 5626 2741 1539

wheresauca 7278 90 2736

elischeesecake 8404 8549 5598

emmaemail 8709 1516 2342

googleplaces 28159 26 924

yelp 43375 98 1847

livingsocial 49668 3611 8958

pepsi 68496 42227 3190

2. Identifying Exhibitors that were using the hashtag was conducted by reading the tweetstream. A few of the accounts were not “official” exhibitor accounts, but either identify themselves in their Twitter handle, bio or by tweeting that they were exhibiting for a company they work for and gave a booth number.

In a conversation last week with a significant franchisee of Papa Murphy’s Pizza brand (with tens of locations and direct corporate HQ relationship), it was shared that they are approached three or more times a week by so-called social media professionals, offering to “build them a Facebook fanpage”. The franchisee laughed in frustration, stating they had established a strong gate-keeper, because nearly all of these approaches were unable to provide the metrics ability businesses require.

On another front, the critique of traditional public relations and marketing firms was heavy over the last few years – that they didn’t “get” social media. With these traditional communication providers unable to advantage social media for their clients, the clients turned to either outsourcing or handling it themselves. As recently as December 2010, I was approached by a national public relations firm seeking a statement of Chalkboarder’s social media abilities – that they could subcontract for the benefit of their clients. Many of these communication firms have now put serious investment into gaining that social media knowledge in the last 18 months.

My question is this: as traditional public relations and marketing firms increasingly offer skilled social media services to their clients, does this reduct the opportunities for other talented communication/social media professionals? Are brands going to return to their public relations/marketing firms that they have had prior relationships with and eschew social media professionals that “got it” early on? Is the industry becoming crowded? Is there value to membership in a social media professional association like Social Media Club versus more traditional associations like the American Marketing Association or Public Relations Society of America?

An additional question would be – how can brands determine the true reach and effectiveness of social media service providers?